Field
Among other things, this disclosure describes systems and methods for providing an alert to an individual when an entity requests to authenticate the individual, such as when the entity is opening an account for the individual.
Description of the Related Art
When an individual has been a victim of identity theft, there is often a significant time delay between the unauthorized use of the individual's identity occurring and the individual becoming aware of the unauthorized use. Identity theft can occur, for example, when someone uses an individual's personal identifying information, without the individual's authorization, in order to perpetrate fraud or other offenses, such as obtaining loans, services, credit and/or opening an account of some kind in the individual's name. The individual's personal identifying information may include, for example, name, Social Security number, credit card number, address, telephone number, date of birth, driver's license or passport number.
Consumers are often advised to periodically monitor their credit reports in order to be aware of inquiries that may potentially be unauthorized or associated with identity fraud. However, there may be substantial delay between the time that an identity authentication request was received and the time that information becomes available on a credit report. While some systems automatically monitor credit reports for information that may be associated with fraudulent requests for credit data or account open transactions, such systems are not able to identify such transactions as they are occurring or to stop such transactions before completion.